


soul deep

by rosethrn



Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:14:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26200204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosethrn/pseuds/rosethrn
Summary: “She sort of sees you like another son, don’t you think?”Killua shrugs when Gon looks back at him, gives him a shove with his foot - his tacit way of telling Gon to get to the point.“So, do you think we’re like brothers then?"“No,” Killua says, and sits up so suddenly that he almost bumps his head on the corner of Gon’s bookshelf. He isn’t sure why, but the word ‘brother’ doesn’t fit Gon. ‘Brother’ is for Illumi, whose harsh words and looming presence still haunt him at night. ‘Brother’ is for Milluki, and the scars that still mark Killua’s back from where his whip hit its mark. ‘Brother’ is not for Gon. He is something else entirely.
Relationships: Gon Freecs/Killua Zoldyck
Comments: 10
Kudos: 247





	soul deep

Killua has seen Gon run straight at enemies three five his size and three times more experienced in battle, but here, standing before Aunt Mito, he looks strangely outmatched. Killua shuts the door behind them and shuffles awkwardly to his side. Mito does look pretty angry. His first thought had been to file Gon’s sheepish expression away in his mind to tease him about later, but with her stern eyes turning on him, the idea has evaporated entirely.

“Where have you boys been?” Her voice rings through the house - firm, rooted in something Killua doesn’t really recognize. Beyond her austere countenance she is still genuine and caring, like always. He looks sideways to Gon - after all, it’s not his mom. Killua’s mother would have already taken a much less diplomatic approach; he’s got the scars to prove it.

“Well, we sorta lost track of time,” Gon begins repentantly. He rubs the back of his neck adorably with his hand as he attempts to explain, and Killua resists the urge to roll his eyes, because Gon has used this method on him before. He would generously give it a success rate of about forty percent based on his own experience (far higher than he’d like to admit).

It’s certainly not enough to satisfy Mito, though, and Killua decides it’s probably time for him to bail. He’s okay with letting Gon take the fall for this - after all, it was his idea to sleep out in the forest, and it was  _ his  _ fault that he had forgotten his promise to Mito they’d be home for dinner. In fact, they wouldn’t have been back until morning if Killua hadn’t remembered just as Gon had been nodding off on his shoulder.

Mito’s fixed her attention on Gon now, who’s still babbling with excuses - enough distraction for Killua to slip into the shadows. His footsteps are nearly silent; an assassin technique, ironically, now nothing more than a means to escape a scolding. Well, if it works. Plus, Killua likes to think about how angry it would make Illumi to see him abusing his training.

Killua is almost around the corner and Gon is halfway through his well rehearsed, lamely executed apology when Mito raises a hand. 

“Not so fast, Killua. No boy of mine will get off that easy.” 

_ Damn _ . Apparently razor-sharp senses run in the family. Gon grins and Killua sticks his tongue out at him as he returns to his side. Something strange turns over in his stomach at the way her remark was phrased. That was the weird thing about the Freecss, he supposed. Even when they were mad, they still had a way of making Killua feel like he belonged there. A warm sensation spreads inside him, and even as Mito is admonishing them, Killua can feel it enveloping his heart and swelling. And then it seemed so plain and obvious. Of course Killua belonged here - he was always supposed to be right by Gon’s side.

“Done!” Gon says, stacking the last shining plate in the cabinet before slinging a triumphant arm around Killua’s shoulders. “That’s every dish. Can we go upstairs now, Aunt Mito?”

“Fine,” she says with a smile. “Thank you, boys.”

“You’re welcome!” Gon replies brightly. He turns to head up the stairs, and Killua makes to follow him.

“Killua, one moment please.”

Gon has already scaled the stairs; Killua turns slowly. There’s a familiar sensation to it. His brain is already working out the possibilities and preparing himself for each one. After all, they had directly disobeyed her. Ignoring orders at the Zoldyck household would have had him strung up already, awaiting punishment - usually from one of his own family. Milluki if he was lucky; Illumi if he wasn’t. Wasn’t that what this was? Mito blamed him, and he would be punished.

“Killua, are you all right?” Mito crosses the room and rests a hand on his shoulder. Killua flinches imperceptibly, his prior thoughts vanishing as he meets her eyes. Of course not. What was he thinking? This wasn’t like back home. Mito had never raised a hand to someone in her life. Killua feels a little embarrassed that the thought could have even occurred to him.

“I just wanted to say thank you. I can tell that you keep Gon in check. He’s lucky to have you.” She smiles, raising a hand to his cheek for a brief moment before it drops down again.

Killua swallows hard; the gesture is so tender, so fond, that his face flushes with embarrassment. 

“Well, I’m glad you’re both all right,” she adds. Killua looks blankly up at her. 

“Killua, come on!” Gon calls from upstairs, and he bounds away like a fleeing rabbit, his cheek still tingling. He wouldn’t mention this to Gon. It was far too embarrassing that it was the gentle touch of a mother, rather than the blows of the hundreds of enemies that Killua had fought in his life, that unsettled him. 

When Killua opens Gon’s bedroom door, he finds his friend waiting cross legged on his bed.

“Isn’t it sort of great how much Mito loves you, too?” Gon asks randomly as Killua plops down beside him.

“What do you mean?” Killua says. He leans against the wall by the bed, latching his arms behind his head. Gon’s room is small, much smaller than his at the mansion, but Killua thinks it is indescribably and infinitely better. Just his bed with stripey sheets, his perpetually open window, his carpet with just enough room for Killua to sleep beside him. And just too little room that, sometimes, Gon’s arm would slide off the side of his bed as he slept and brush against Killua’s shoulder. 

“I don’t really know because, well, I haven’t brought anyone home but you! But Mito seems to like you a whole lot, right? And I don’t mind sharing her with you, because I think she’s much nicer than your mom.” Gon starts pulling the mattress out from under his bed; Killua’s more familiar with it than his own bed at home by now. 

He chuckles at Gon’s back in amused agreement. “I guess so.”

“She sort of sees you like another son, don’t you think?”

Killua shrugs when Gon looks back at him, gives him a shove with his foot - his tacit way of telling Gon to get to the point.

“So, do you think we’re like brothers then?”

“No,” Killua says, and sits up so suddenly that he almost bumps his head on the corner of Gon’s bookshelf. He isn’t sure why, but the word ‘brother’ doesn’t fit Gon. ‘Brother’ is for Illumi, whose harsh words and looming presence still haunt him at night. ‘Brother’ is for Milluki, and the scars that still mark Killua’s back from where his whip hit its mark. ‘Brother’ is not for Gon. He is something else entirely. 

“Oh, you don’t think?” Gon deflates slightly, like he’s considering something else now. Gon’s the type of person who thinks with his whole body - Killua’s seen him freeze in place for minutes at a time when making important decisions. But when the moment passes, he just resumes tucking the blankets around the edge of Killua’s mattress.

Words seem to stick in Killua’s mouth now, and he coughs awkwardly to try to defuse the unfamiliar tension in the room. “I don’t know. Do you think we’re like brothers?”

Gon sits back on his legs. There’s an implication behind the question that Killua didn’t even intend for until it came out, but he doubts Gon would pick up on it. Even though Killua is burning to know the answer to that, too.

He pulls one of the pillows off his bed and places it at the end of Killua’s mattress. “No,” comes his eventual answer. “We’re more.”

Then he jumps to his feet to switch off the lights and leaps to his bed before Killua can work out what that means.  _ We’re more. _ Certainly that is to mean that they’re simply closer than brothers. The alternative is, well, impossible. Killua knows that, and his first thought is to plunge that possibility into the back of his mind, where it can’t nag at him.

Killua creeps onto the mattress and wraps the blankets around him. He blinks, eyes adjusting to the darkness quickly, until the moonlight from Gon’s window is just enough to illuminate the outline of Gon’s bed and its occupant. Killua rolls over to face away from him. 

_ We’re more _ . Huh. 

Though the thought is unimaginably ridiculous, the logical part of Killua’s brain, always determined to puzzle out every possible outcome, lingers on the  _ other _ interpretation of Gon’s words. It’s not an entirely unexplored concept in Killua’s mind. He thinks about it sometimes when they’re apart for too long and he feels his heart tightening at the thought of him. He thinks about it when their hands brush unnecessarily, or when Gon stares at him for too long and Killua has to flick him on the forehead. And now, lying in the dark on Gon’s bedroom floor, the idea occurs to him again - that perhaps  _ friend _ has become too weak of a word to describe what Gon is to him. After all, Killua can’t see himself wanting anyone else by his side for the rest of his life. 

Just as the idea is taking blissful form in his mind, reason crashes down on him. Why would Killua ever push the boundaries of their friendship? Why now, after years of having their bond put to every painful test and surviving, would Killua risk any of it on the  _ possibility  _ that Gon sees things the same way? 

And yet, Killua can’t help but imagine a world where Gon lies beside him every night; where their hands brush together, but not by accident; where there is no obstacle they face alone and no objective more important than staying by the other’s side. 

Killua squeezes his eyes shut and wills sleep to quiet his deafening thoughts. He focuses instead on Gon’s soft breathing, matching it to his own. It slowly evens out as Gon drifts off, and starts snoring instead. Killua rolls his eyes. Now he’ll never fall asleep.

Once a half hour goes by and Gon’s snoring isn’t so cute anymore, Killua decides smothering him to death might be necessary. He sends a pillow flying towards the bed, and mercifully, the other boy stills. The snoring stops. Killua moves to lie down again. Now he’s got no pillow, but oh well. He’s slept in far worse circumstances.

“You’re still awake, Killua.”

“Couldn’t fall asleep with all your noise,” he grumbles back.

“Come up here, then,” Gon says sleepily. 

Killua pauses, and there is nothing but the breeze rustling the trees outside and the suddenly loud thrumming of his heart. He’s never done that before. Not like this.

“Why?”

“Whenever I couldn’t sleep, I would always sleep next to Aunt Mito, and it made it much easier.” His eyes are still closed, and it’s too dark anyway for Killua to read his expression. 

Killua forces his heartbeat to slow down, reminds himself that to Gon, sharing a bed is perfectly innocuous.

“I’m not a little kid.”

“I know.”

Killua edges a little closer, in spite of himself. “And you won’t snore.”

“Nope, not at all.”

Killua hesitates. Then, against his better judgement, he crawls up onto the bed beside Gon, drawing up the blankets around him. Gon rolls over to make room. It’s a bit cramped - the bed wasn’t made for two people - but they fit. They’re face to face now, and though the other boy’s eyes are still shut, he’s close enough that Killua can feel his breath, just faintly. If he listens, he can hear Gon’s heartbeat too. He hopes Gon can’t hear his.

“Killua.”

Gon’s voice drags him out of his thoughts. Killua doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to hearing Gon say his name, like the chime of a bell, ringing and echoing out each syllable.  _ Kil-lu-a. _

“Mm?”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Okay.” 

Gon opens his eyes, and Killua squirms uncomfortably under his gaze. “Am I important to you?”

Killua snorts softly. “What sort of question is that, stupid?”

Gon blinks. “What do you mean?”

“Of course you are,” Killua mumbles through his teeth, like he’d rather not have to say the words out loud. “That’s why we stick together.”

“Good, cause you’re important to me.”

Killua’s cheeks heat up, and he’s suddenly glad that the lights are off, because if Gon could see him blushing, he’d never hear the end of it. He’s pretty sure he wouldn’t have admitted any of that ordinarily, but in the dark, with Gon’s hand grazing his under the covers, their knees bumping together, it doesn’t seem so hard. In the morning, he can claim he was too tired and speaking nonsense; he can say that the brushing of skin was due to the unavoidable lack of space in Gon’s bed. That would certainly be easier than admitting what a smaller and more honest part of his heart tells him. 

“Okay,” Killua murmurs back.

“Really important,” Gon repeats, and then his hand drifts up experimentally to touch Killua’s hair, and his breath catches in his throat. There’s something different about the way Gon is touching him now - something electrifying - and Killua knows electricity. For a brief moment, he worries that the burning heat emanating from his body in waves is actually aura, but his eyes are shut too tightly in equal measures of bliss and embarrassment to confirm. The shift of Gon’s hand is steady and warm and grounding, so he doesn’t think he’s electrocuted him just yet. Even if he somehow activated Godspeed, Killua is sure that it wouldn’t hurt him. That even when the connection between body and mind is severed and his movements are based purely in animal reflex, he would still act in accordance with his primary and immutable objective: to protect Gon. How magnificently ridiculous that is - the idea of laying down your mind, body, and soul for another. But Killua would.

He wants to brush Gon off, to call it stupid, because it  _ is _ , and if Killua said something now, maybe he could prevent the dam of emotion that he’d left so carefully undisturbed for years from breaking. That would certainly make the most sense. Wasn’t self-preservation what Killua was best at?

And yet, for no sensible reason at all, Killua leans inadvertently into the touch -  _ he must look so pathetic _ \- and Gon’s thumb drifts down across his cheek, tracing downwards to his jaw, and then across his pulse point to his neck. 

“Why are you doing that?” Killua whispers, and his voice sounds so small, so vulnerable, that he wants to draw the words back as soon as they fall out. But Gon’s eyes become softer still, impossibly soft, and he can’t help himself.

“I want to, Killua,” Gon says, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world, and when his free hand moves to drift along Killua’s chest, he thinks he’s died and gone to heaven. 

Killua doesn’t know much about best friends. He hasn’t had one before Gon. He’s fairly certain, though, that this was not what friends did. He guessed that Gon thought this was normal between friends, and Killua was too selfish to tell him otherwise. Gon’s thumb was ghosting across his lips now, drawing a contented sigh out of him, and Killua was  _ letting  _ him. Wasn’t he supposed to be the one keeping Gon in check? Telling him when he had crossed the line, since Gon could rarely judge it for himself?

“Gon.”

“What?” 

“You shouldn’t.”

Gon’s hands froze, and that smaller part of Killua’s heart objected.

“You want me to stop?”

“No,” Killua says quickly, before he can prevent it. “I just - I don’t think you realize what you’re doing.”

“Of course I do,” Gon murmurs. “I’m making Killua feel better. Right?”

Killua swallows. What the hell is he supposed to say to that?

“It’s just,” Killua begins, with no idea how he’s supposed to explain this to Gon, and even less inclination to do so as Gon’s fingers start threading through his hair. “It’s not exactly normal… for friends… to touch each other so much.”

Killua closes his eyes again in a mix of enjoyment and humiliation. 

“But we’re not just friends, Killua!” Gon chirps back. “Remember?”

“That’s not what I mean!” he snaps back. “God, are you going to make me say it?”

Gon’s hands move to Killua’s shoulders, then, his left hand moves to trace a path down Killua’s arm, following the pale line of his veins all the way down to his wrist. He holds his breath.

Then, Gon turns Killua’s hand over in his and brings it up to his face, pressing a kiss to the flat of Killua’s palm.

Killua yanks his hand away as though burned, his heart threatening to spring right out of his chest. “Gon! What the hell are you doing?”

“I don’t know. I thought you would like it,” comes his reply. 

_ I do I do I do _ .

“Gon, you’re doing what… couples do,” Killua manages to say through gritted teeth. He really wishes he didn’t have to be the one to tell Gon these things. “People who  _ like  _ each other. In a romantic way."

“So?” Gon asks softly. “I like Killua. I  _ want  _ to do it. Unless... do you not want me to?”

“You don’t get it, stupid!”

“Yes I do!” Gon grumbles back, his expression somehow equally frustrated and fond. “I thought about it all when we were going to sleep, and now I’ve decided!”

“What, just now? It doesn’t work like that!” Killua hisses, though upon second thought, it probably does for Gon.

“Well, I’ve only just realized, but I guess I knew before too. I just hope I haven’t kept you waiting.”

Killua doesn’t know what to say to that, so he doesn’t. He fists the soft fabric of Gon’s shirt and pulls them together, and logic escapes him for the first time in his life when the distance between them evaporates.

Gon kisses like he fights: aggressive and determined, and perhaps a little clumsy. His lips and skin are warm beyond what should be reasonable, and Killua feels it spread like fire from every point of contact between them; lips, hands, knees. Gon’s hands reach up to cradle his face, and Killua feels his heart threatening to explode when they finally break apart, breathing heavily.

“I wanted to be the one to do that,” Gon says with a pout.

Killua rolls his eyes. That was Gon, of course.


End file.
